


celestial entity, you don't intimidate me

by inberin



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-28
Updated: 2018-09-28
Packaged: 2019-07-18 08:03:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16114256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inberin/pseuds/inberin
Summary: two half-galra on two separate missions meet on enemy territory for an unconventional meet-cute. hijinks ensue.





	celestial entity, you don't intimidate me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [soldiergame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/soldiergame/gifts).



> i break my two-year long silence for you noir

The entrances are always the same: slip out of the tiny Blade ship and into the cold darkness of space, then put the thrusters on and make your way to the carefully researched entry point, hoping the sentries aren’t on the lookout for any object smaller than a standard-issue fighter. Simple stuff.

“ _You have three doboshes before they complete the changing of guards_ ,” says Ilun’s sharp voice in his ear, crackling with static but firm and steady.

“Got it.”

When Coran had locked himself in one of the engine rooms to fix something some months back, Allura had decided to pilot the Castle of Lions on her own. It was just a short distance, from one planet in a solar system to another, and with their speed it shouldn’t have taken more than half a minute—half a dobosh. Pidge tried her best with the equations, but they still sped right past the planet before Allura could stop the ship. It had looked so small through the windows, just a round thing of orange and pink no bigger than a football. And then they’d descended, and the planet grew bigger, and bigger, and bigger, and bigger, until all they could see was gold.

The dreadnought looms ahead of him as he approaches, turning the power up on his suit thrusters and propelling himself towards the mass of deep violet metal. It’s nowhere near large enough to have its own gravity, but Keith feels like the Castle, hurrying to slow its fall towards an unfeeling giant over a hundred thousand times its size.

“ _Two doboshes, Keith._ ”

He comes to rest near the underside of the ship. Just reach up an arm to feel about and—there. A manual emergency exit port, for when all other failsafes had failed. It's an old flaw in the blueprints; the Galran mantra of _victory or death_ would never have allowed for an escape hole like this one. But this was the last of the Mark I line of Dahlug dreadnaughts, lovingly maintained for almost a thousand years since its creation and running as well as any modern cruiser. A coward’s escape is still vehemently against all Galran morals, however, and so the exit port is abandoned and sealed shut.

It also means no guards, not until the usual patrols pass by the area. Keith makes quick work of the old welding with a laser and the hatch pops open with a rush of depressurised air, and just like that, he’s in.

“ _One._ ”

The mission is simple: this is an old ship, with old data. The Blades need that data to cross-reference with their current knowledge of past battles and colonies, to make sure that all possible avenues for help have been exhausted, and all cries for aid have been answered. If it’d been any more complicated, they’d have sent Keith with a partner.

If it’d been any more complicated, they probably wouldn’t have sent Keith at all. He lets the thought rattle around in his head for a while, lets the irritation set into his bones. Then he pushes it aside because he has a mission to do.

“ _The guards are done. Start moving now._ ”

The map is clear. Two rights, a left, down through an air vent and out into a secluded corridor adjacent to the bridge. From there, it should be straightforward enough to break into a minor bridge control room and access the data.

Or it should’ve been straightforward, until the first wrench in Keith’s plans leaves him stuck in the air vent, peeking through the slits as a patrol team marches up and down the area, a full varga earlier than they should be.

Keith slinks back down the length of the vent as one of the robot guards scans the ceiling. “Ilun,” he hisses into his comms once he’s sure he’s completely out of earshot, “have I been spotted? The hatch isn’t welded, but it’s shut. Do they know?”

“ _The guards seem to be on increased alert, but they don’t seem to be conducting an all-out search. Something you’ve done must have spooked them. Are you sure you’ve shut the hatch?_ ”

“Yes,” he says, barely able to keep the annoyance out of his voice. He’s absolutely sure because the door had shut and stuck fast, and was going to be a pain to get open again later. A small misstep like that wasn’t enough to abandon the mission, but an increased chance of getting caught just might be. “Have they been tipped off?”

“ _This mission came from Kolivan himself. Even if we have a traitor in our midst, they couldn’t have gotten the information out that fast._ ” A heavy pause. “ _And I don’t want to think about that._ ”

“Sorry.” There really isn’t any other possibility, unless…

“ _In_ _any case, you should abort the mission. If you get caught we’d be down a Blade, and the information isn’t worth that._ ”

Keith shakes his head, even though he knows Ilun can’t see it. “I’ve still got a chance. They’re on high alert, not searching. They don’t know I’m here yet.”

“ _Keith._ ” Ilun sounds tired. “ _I won’t tell you you’re irreplaceable, but it’d be a massive pain in the behind to train another Blade to your level._ ”

“Then I’ll make sure you won’t have to.” The guards have seemed to clear their location of all suspicion, and file down the corridor in pairs. “The early patrol is leaving the area. I’m carrying on with the mission.”

Ilun sighs, the lamentation blunted by his high, musical voice. “ _I can’t stop you. Be careful._ ”

Careful? A Blade? “I will.” He shuts off his comms. _Knowledge or death_.

The vent screen comes off as easily as the one Keith had pried off to enter, but it takes a little while to make sure all visible corridors are empty, and a while longer to drop down from the ceiling without making too much noise. The replaced screen is a little skewed, but it’s nothing anyone would notice unless they were actively looking for it.

He presses close to a wall and listens for any incoming footsteps. Hearing none, he sticks his head out to check the left corridor.

Something sharp pricks against the back of his neck.

Wrench number two, inadvertent creator of wrench number one, says in a quiet tenor, “And what do we have here?”

His luxite knife falls into his hand as easy as breathing and the arc he swings it in is a smooth exhale of motion, smashing into the edge that had been against his skin. The other intruder staggers back with the force of the blow, going right into defense.

It’s a sword in their hand, a cold gunmetal blade lit with violet from the lights glowing in its cross-guard and pommel. Keith’s seen some tricked-out weapons in his travels, but the sword simply carries a subdued sort of vanity with it, like hiding a gaudy jewel under a dull piece of cloth when all you want to do is show it off to everyone.

The wielder of the jewel backs away, clearly wary. They’re light on their feet, confident in their stance—if he hadn’t caught them off guard he’d have lost the upper hand in this fight. Their clothing seems to be pieced together, all tattered cloth and ragged edges, like a pirate or a non-Blade rebel against the Empire. But there’s an uncomfortable perfection to the getup, as though they’d put too much effort into it.

Their face isn’t visible through their helmet and neither is Keith’s, but they clearly give him a once-over of their own. “Your dagger,” they say. “That symbol. You’re a Blade.”

“This ends now,” snaps Keith, and lunges forward with the short blade.

“What does the Blade of Marmora want with this rustbucket?” The intruder ducks his swing with an quick dip of their head, and steps out of the way of a follow-up. “The technology is old, and its commander even more so. Surely there are better things to go after?”

None of his attacks are getting through. Irritation flares again, and his stabs get faster. “It’s none of your business.”

“On the contrary. The Galra Empire is very much my business. It’d be inconvenient for me if your little rebel troupe took it down.”

“Will you shut up and _stop jumping around_.”

“No,” says the intruder as they jump out of the way of another slice of his dagger. “I have questions, and you’re not answering them.”

“I don’t have to answer anything!”

“True.” The intruder isn’t even fighting back, just weaving between each cut and jab like it’s _easy_. “But I can do this for at least until the next patrol comes by, and I think that would be quite detrimental to your plans. Mine too, of course,” they add as an afterthought, “but for you, much more so.”

“What’s so special about this ship anyway?” Keith feints right as he speaks, then swings forward in the same direction just as the intruder attempts to evade a potential attack from the left.

They raise their blade for the first time since they began this ridiculous farce of a fight, and it’s to neatly block the arc of Keith’s blow, a long blade against a short one, holding defense. They’re strong, Keith notes. Very strong. “It’s just a useless old ship. Nothing you need to know about.”

“If it’s so useless,” Keith hisses at the glass of the helmet just in front of his own, the strain starting to show in his voice, “then what are you here for?”

He can’t see the smile, but it’s clear in their voice. “You've got me there.”

“I did,” agrees Keith, and the luxite dagger bursts into light.

In a heartbeat, the blade shoots out to nearly three times its former length, and the speed of it sends it stabbing towards the intruder’s neck. They dodge somehow, impossibly quick, but the edge nicks the underside of the helmet and Keith hears a mechanism in it go _snick_ and the entire thing goes flying off with the sheer speed of their dodge.

Their swords hold fast, however, and they’re still in a stalemate even as long white hair tumbles down pointed ears and wide shoulders, framing the sharp features of a face that Keith’s seen countless times in the Blade database.

“Lotor?” The name is unfamiliar on his tongue, but the steely look he gets in return is answer enough.

The lone prince of the Galra Empire sighs and narrows his fine, pale brows at him. “Now I have to end _you_.”

Lotor fights with discipline. Each thrust and every parry is controlled, calculated; a veteran swordmaster, stronger than Keith and with a longer reach. But Keith is faster, and as he blocks and ripostes with his own unpolished swordplay, Lotor can’t land a single blow on him.

He steps into Lotor’s space and slashes at his chest, but he’s just a tad too slow, and his opponent evades it with some quick footwork. A strange sound escapes from him as he staggers back.

It’s an exhale, but it doesn’t sound like a cry of pain. “What?”

“You’re good.” Lotor’s eyes glint in the cold light of the corridor. “Where have you been?”

In Red’s cockpit, learning how to get along with a team he didn’t ask for. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Surely the Blade would have made much more progress if their ranks were filled with warriors like you.” He swings back in, and Keith hurries to block his blows. “Are you new? Inexperienced? But you’re on your own. I’d have been attacked by now if you had company.”

Keith curses under his breath as he inches backwards from Lotor’s offense. How is he still _talking_? “I’ve been a Blade all my life,” he sputters, hoping that the mask hiding his face helps to sell his words, “and I’ve got a partner just across the bridge. You’re screwed once I alert her.”

“Hmm,” is all Lotor says.

He can’t tell if that means he believes him or not, he’s never been a very good liar. But he’s a good fighter, so he just gives Lotor as good as he gets and soon enough he’s struggling against Lotor’s sword, bringing his luxite blade perilously close to lilac skin.

The sound happens again, a sharp exhale, and this close to him Keith can recognise it for what it is—a breathless laugh.

His vision goes white at the edges with rage. He’s about to fail the mission and maybe die doing so, and Lotor thinks it’s funny? He bears down on his sword with renewed vigour, and is rewarded with an inch more of give, the edge of his blade almost close enough to slice open one refined cheekbone.

It takes him a while to realise that all the mirth is gone from Lotor’s face, his eyes wide, his mouth slightly parted. Keith snarls at the expression—what’s it supposed to be? Surprise? At what?

“I’ve offended you,” Lotor says, quietly.

Keith freezes up.

It’s a clear opening, one that a swordsmaster would waste no time in exploiting. With a flick of his wrist, Lotor breaks away, then swings his sword back in. Keith counters it easily, but Lotor follows up with blow after blow. A cut. A jab. Another swing. Their swords cross over and over, but again they both step back unscathed. Keith doesn’t pause for more than a second, his frustration building, and he ignores his own defense to stab again inside Lotor’s reach.

He should’ve known the same trick wouldn’t work twice. Lotor leaps backwards and quickly puts distance between them, blade flashing. Then he lunges back in at a full swing, and Keith barely has enough time to lift his own sword to brace against it.

The resulting crash reverberates through the corridor and echoes down the surrounding chambers.

They’ve already jolted back from each other after the crash, but now they lock eyes, weapons still in hand. Lotor is the first to give, slowly lowering his sword and retrieving his helmet, shrinking it down into its chip and replacing it in his suit. He doesn’t reactivate it. Fine, whatever. He can air out his face if he likes. One of them still needs the anonymity.

Keith waits a little longer to make sure this isn’t just one big feint, then lets his own sword shrink back to dagger size. Both blades are sheathed, each carefully watching as the other puts their weapon away. They hold the gaze for a little longer, just to be sure neither has any other tricks up their sleeve.

And then they both turn and start sprinting for the bridge.

“ _What?_ ” hisses Keith as he breaks into a full run.

“What do you mean, _what_? I have business on the bridge.” Lotor has no issues keeping pace with his longer legs. But he’s not pushing ahead, simply staying at speed with Keith. It’s irritating. “Oh, are you referring to your mysterious partner waiting in ambush there? That’s no matter. My associates would’ve already taken her out.”

Keith doesn’t respond, trying to recall the layout of the ship and its sentry patrols. If the time now is—then he needs to turn—

They both take a sharp right in unison.

It’s really starting to tick him off.

“Of course,” Lotor adds, like his running partner isn’t already this close to slicing off his head, “that’s assuming your partner is even real. Which I highly doubt. Have you considered taking storytelling lessons?”

Keith’s glare won’t show through the visor of his mask, but the rude gesture he sends Lotor’s way is very much visible. He doesn’t know if it translates to Galra, but he catches a glimpse of pointed teeth and a barked laugh and figures the sentiment carries.

Lotor’s hair streams out behind him like a banner as he runs. “I’ve never seen that before. Is that a Blade greeting?”

“Yeah. Sure.” Another right turn here—Lotor follows suit—and the path to the bridge should be straight ahead. He starts to pull ahead.

Long fingers curl like a vise around his wrist, jerking him back _hard_.

Keith is swinging back with his free arm before he can even take a shocked breath, and the base of his palm collides firmly with the underside of Lotor’s jaw. _First hit I’ve landed on him yet_ , he notes absently, watching surprise and pain bloom across Lotor’s face in quick succession as he lets go of Keith.

The hand he’d grabbed Keith’s wrist with is now pressed against his jaw, his eyes narrowed into pained slits.

Keith blinks. “Uh,” he says. “Sor—”

He's startled into silence when Lotor swiftly brings his free hand up to Keith's face, his single outstretched finger almost brushing his lips, then uses the same hand to jab an access code into a door.

The door hisses open, and he ducks inside while still holding his face, beckoning Keith to follow.

Keith hesitates. Is this a trap? Lotor mentioned associates. Are they in this room right now, ready to ambush him for real?

Then Lotor puts his finger to his own lips again, eyes wide and urgent, and Keith finally hears the distant stomping of metallic boots.

He sprints into the room, and the door shuts behind him with another hiss.

They're in a… circuit room? It's in no way his realm of expertise, but he recognises circuit boards and wires curled around metal boxes and blinking electronic lights. They definitely shouldn't be here.

Lotor's picking his way through the organised clutter of the room, checking under tables and peering into metal cabinets. “This one’s empty,” he says in a low voice. The cabinet he's gesturing to has a small mess of coiled cords at the bottom, but sure enough, it's empty enough to comfortably fit a person as large as Lotor.

Keith gives him a curt nod. “You take that one. I'll keep looking.”

“Eh?” He's lifted his hand from his socked jaw, so Keith can see every inch of confusion on his face, along with the splotch of darker purple from where he'd been hit. By Keith. “No, I—”

Muffled speech comes from outside. The patrol’d stopped right outside their door. There's some bickering, and then the angry beeping of an access code entered wrong.

Not enough time. Keith scans the room again, and settles on hiding behind one of the larger metal boxes to prepare an ambush. It sounds like a small patrol, maybe two or three guards judging from the footsteps. He can take one out, then use the resulting surprise to nullify a second. A third would be troublesome, but if he couldn't handle it then the mission would fail alongside him. It'll have to work. He starts to draw his dagger.

“Fool!” hisses a voice from behind him. The same fingers wrap around his wrist again, and this time he lets himself be pulled forward and into the large cabinet. Lotor slams the door shut just as the door to the entrance starts to open.

“There's no one in here, I told you.”

“I saw what I saw! One of ‘em Blades, I warrant!”

“You're always seeing something or another. Don't know why they put you on guard duty.”

“That's not nice to say!”

The glow from the luxite dagger and the lights of Keith’s mask splash violet over the white curtain of hair slowly falling, strand by strand, over his shoulder. “Shh,” Lotor says, and Keith hears the soft exhale of the sound brushing against his ear, even though his hood is up. He fights back a shiver.

It's a bad fit. Keith's crouched close to the floor while leaning against one cold metal wall, his legs folded awkwardly under him to stay balanced on the uneven cabling. Lotor, on the other hand, is too tall to stand fully upright, and his torso arches over Keith as he holds himself up with both his arms. His head droops down close to the back of Keith’s hood, the full length of his hair now draped over Keith's shoulder.

“Do pardon me,” Lotor whispers and tries to toss his hair back over his shoulder. All it does is slap Keith's neck really hard and make his hood fall off. “Ah.”

“Shh,” echoes Keith, pulling his hood back on with some difficulty, his dagger still gripped tightly in his hand.

“There,” says one of the voices from right outside their cabinet. Keith holds his breath. “There's no one here. Are you happy now? We're behind time.”

“You know we're here to make sure we be catching that ol’ intruder! S’why we're being paid extra!”

Keith pokes one of Lotor's outstretched legs with his knife and tries to give him a pointed look through his mask. Lotor kicks irritably and swings his hair right over Keith's head so he has to shake it out of his face.

“Doesn't mean we have to work ourselves to the bone for it. Whoever it is is probably well on their way out by now.”

“Whoa, we leavin’? But we haven't checked the big cabinets!”

His hand tightens around the dagger's hilt.

“Weren't you listening? The intruder was in the west wing. There's absolutely no way they'll be here.”

“Hmph. I s’pose you're right.”

The footsteps march away, and Keith lets out his held breath, relaxing his grip on his dagger. But Lotor is still all coiled tension.

He goes immediately for the cabinet door right after they hear the room seal shut, but Keith reaches over his head and grabs Lotor's hand before it touches metal.

“ _What?_ ” Lotor snaps, teetering a little with only one hand to steady his precarious position.

Keith has also used the hand that was keeping from falling forward, and now he hangs off of Lotor's forearm, feeling stupid. “Wait. Always wait.”

Hearing Lotor fall silent behind him, he counts backwards from twenty, like he'd been taught. Though he feels a lot less professional clinging onto a member of the royal family like some sort of rebel monkey. Or anarchist flea.

“Two… one. Okay,” Keith says in a normal tone of voice. “Now you can—”

Lotor jerks his arm out of Keith's grasp and flings the door open.

Some things happen.

Keith, no longer having anything to hold him up, tumbles forward out of the cabinet and nearly impales himself on his own knife, dropping it just in time. His flailing legs, however, manage to catch on one of the cords on the floor of the cabinet, which pulls taut and drags the rest of the mess down with it.

Lotor, in the middle of putting one foot forward, suddenly feels the ‘ground’ he's standing on _shift_ , and starts sliding forward feet first in a trajectory he can't stop.

The newly-produced heap on the floor consists mostly of Keith (facedown, sans dagger) and around twelve metres worth of electrical cable spilled onto and around him, all topped off by Lotor (face still bruised, sans dignity).

“Well,” Lotor says tetchily, testing out one foot and finding it thoroughly tangled. “I, for one, am very glad we waited.”

“ _G’offa me_.”

“So impatient. Just a tick.” With a swing of his legs, Lotor slides off the heap and onto the floor, along with most of the cables. Keith undoes his own milder tangles and clambers free. His dagger had skittered a small length away when he dropped it and he goes over to pick it up, examining it for damage.

“Help me out of this,” Lotor demands from the floor.

Keith stares. “You got yourself into that mess.”

“Because I was—still am, in fact—in a hurry. Now would you please help?”

“I’m kind of in a hurry myself, since you started this whole manhunt and blew my cover.”

Lotor bares his teeth. “On the contrary. I never stepped foot in the west wing. But now I must, to retrieve one of my… associates. So a hand would be nice, agent.”

Oh. Right. A partner then, or a friend. Reading doesn’t come easily to Keith, whether it’s on paper or on faces and postures, but the urgency on Lotor’s face seems real enough, and he steps forward to crouch beside the mess of rubber and wire on the floor.

“This has earned you favour, agent.” Lotor’s grimace quirks up at the corners into a mirthless smile as he tugs at the cords stretched across one of his knees. “I hope your hands are as nimble as your swordplay, because this might take some time to unravel.”

Keith shrugs. “Don't need that. Swordplay solves most of my problems.” The dagger in his hand transforms back into a blade. Lotor freezes up, then warily drops his guard as he realises Keith’s solution isn’t to lop his head off.

It’s simple enough to shred the cables, but it takes a little longer to shove all the pieces back in the closet so as not to leave a trace. All in all, it takes less time and effort than actually untangling Lotor so Keith considers it a success.

Lotor’s already moving, opening the door with a hand to the sensor. “Your speed earns you more favour,” he says, gathering his hair up with one hand and activating his helmet with the other. He lets go of his hair just as the panels flip up his head, and it all falls neatly into the helmet. Disgusting. “Your transgressions will be overlooked. Consider yourself pardoned of all crimes, should you be caught today.”

Keith bristles. “That’s not gonna happen.”

Lotor pauses in his exit. Keith can’t see his eyes now either, but he seems to stare into him regardless. “No,” he agrees. “It won’t happen. But some insurance never hurt anyone.”

“And if I don’t need your insurance?” asks Keith, before he can think better of it. “What’s the favour for, then?”

That sharp, breathy laugh again. “You have a prince in your debt, agent of rebellion. You’ll find a price to name.” And then he’s gone, disappeared into the pathways of the dreadnaught.

Keith blinks at the sudden silence. He’s alone, the way he was supposed to be on this mission, but finally hearing the quiet hum of the ship around him again feels odd. A sudden displaced brick in the pavement on a route he takes every day.

His comms beeps and he activates it, feeling routine seep back into his bones. “Ilun?”

“ _Keith!_ ” Ilun’s pretty voice is strained with panic. “ _Keith, you have to get out of there._ ”

“What? Why?” Keith checks his time limit. He’s still got a good varga left, even after his run-in with the prince of the Galra empire. “I’ve still got time.”

“ _T_ _here’s someone else on the ship._ ”

A bubble of laughter threatens to burst out of his chest and he has to choke it down. _Boy do I know_. “How else is it flying, then,” he manages instead.

“ _This isn’t the times for jokes, Keith! Your mission is compromised and you’re in danger._ ”

He takes a breath to steady himself. “Ilun, listen. They’re searching the west wing. It’s only a matter of time until they realise the hatch has been opened. The only way I have left is forward with the plan.”

Ilun is silent for a bit. “ _I don’t like this, Keith._ ”

“I’ll be fine, Ilun.” He peeks out around a corridor. No swords to his neck, just a cold draft. “I’ve got… insurance, so to speak.”

“ _That doesn’t sound very promising._ ” Always the skeptic. “ _Do I have to tell Kolivan?_ ”

“No, no! It’s nothing he needs to know. I’ll give you a heads up when I get to the control room and then you’ll actually be able to do your job. Sound good?”

“ _Sounds excellent. I was getting tired of playing mission control._ ”

“You can say ‘babysitting’, Ilun.”

Ilun scoffs. “ _I’m only a couple deca-phoebs older than you. And I’d have a lot less patience with you if you were a child._ ”

Keith waits for a patrol to pass by and lets himself smile, just a little. Ilun’s sweet, firm but kind, curt but never aloof. Hearing that he’d be working an easy mission with Ilun had taken some of the sting out of knowing that he was still too volatile to be sent on anything more important.

“Thanks, Ilun,” he says once the guards have gone out of earshot. “I’ll talk to you later.”

The bridge is just up ahead, sure, but the increased alert means that it’s buzzing with activity. Automated sentries march out of and into charging rooms, and actual Galran guards loiter around the area, presumably waiting for instructions on their next patrol. Getting in unseen was going to be a pain.

Keith’s considering going back to the circuit room and cobbling together some kind of bomb as a distraction when a soft _whumph_ sounds from behind him, followed by a small tremor. Oh _good_ , he thinks to himself as he launches himself at the pipes lining the ceiling, swinging himself up and hooking his foot around a pipe to press himself flat. A small crowd of guards hurry past his hiding spot, too occupied to notice him When the coast is clear, he drops back down and heads towards the bridge entrance.

It's almost deserted. The last of the low-power sentries enters its charging room and Keith makes a break for the control room just opposite. Learning passcodes in Galran is always a challenge, but the Dahlug is just the right amount of unimportant that the commander only really has two passcodes for everything. Keith taps in the first combination, the door cheerily informs him of his failure, he tries the other, and he’s in.

“Oh, Krevig? What, did you forget the code.. again…”

The lone Galra standing in the control room stares at Keith, who stares back.

“Uh,” they say, dumbly. “You’re not Krevig.”

Keith socks them in the face.

Finishing up the bindings on the guard’s wrists and ankles, he hides them haphazardly under the control panel, then finally contacts Ilun. “Hey. I’m in.”

“ _You’re not in, Keith,_ ” Ilun trills, “ _until_ I _get my digits into that system._ ”

He gets so weird in hacker mode. “Tell me what I need to do.”

“ _Put the drive I gave you into one of the docks in the panel._ ”

Keith peers at the front of the drive, then at the empty docks on the panel, and just sticks it into one at random. “Okay, done. What's next?”

“ _Good_.” A window pops up and begins running some sort of code. “ _J_ _ust sit and wait_.”

He screws up his face. “Really? I just wait here until you're done or someone catches me?”

“ _You're there to guard the drive, Keith. You're not supposed to get caught_.”

Chastised, Keith grumbles, “fine, I get it.”

“ _Open another window and find an article to read. It'll be good for you_.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.” He didn't drop out of school and leave Earth _and_ join a rebel organisation to do more readings. “I'm happy just waiting.”

“ _Then you can help me keep an eye on the cameras_.” Several more windows pop up, showing various locations near the control room.

Some belated realisation creeps up behind Keith. “There were _cameras?_ ”

Ilun sniffs loftily. “ _I'm too good to just play at being mission control, Keith. I've been looping the footage wherever you've been_.”

No. That means— “You've seen Lotor?”

“ _Lotor? Do you mean Prince Lotor?_ ” Ilun sounds thoroughly confused. “ _He should have nothing to do with this mission. Does he have an operative on the Dahlug, Keith?_ ”

“Yes—I mean no! No. Why would there… be?”

“ _You brought this up, Keith._ ”

He’s absolutely panicking. “So you, uh, can’t see anything when you loop the footage, huh?”

“ _No. I scout ahead of where you’re going and start the loop before you enter. What’s going on?_ ”

“There was… a room. An electricity room. Did you loop that too?”

“ _Hmm._ ” A bit of silence, then a soft crackle as he comes back on. “ _No. There aren’t any cameras in that room, which means it’s either a storage room or just that unimportant. What were you doing in there?_ ”

“Hiding.” It’s not a lie.

“ _I_ _hope you realise this is all very suspicious._ ”

“I know. But the mission is uncompromised.”

Ilun sighs deep. “ _’m afraid that’s not the case. The west wing explosion won’t keep them distracted for long._ ” Another window opens itself, this time displaying a feed of what seems to be just grey, until some of it dissipates and reveals itself as smoke. _“We’re on borrowed time._ ”

There’s a small pang in Keith’s chest. “So I’ve failed.”

“ _Keith._ ” Steady and firm. _“That’s not what I meant. The mission isn’t a failure until we’ve succeeded, or we’re dead. And we’re currently neither.”_

Keith takes a breath. “Yes, sir.”

“ _Good. Now let me work._ ”

He watches the cameras, absently noting that the code on Ilun’s window has turned into a loading bar. Most of the ship’s manpower had been called down to deal with the aftermath of the explosion. It doesn’t look that bad, just some charred ground and walls and what looks like a couple of smashed robots. The smoke still obscures most of the camera’s view, but he can see one of the guards step into view, blaster at the ready.

A silent laser bursts out of the smoke and slams the guard right in the chest.

More guards swarm forward as the first one falls, but well-timed blaster shots take them out one by one from the cover of the smoke. Then a shadowy figure appears in the swirling grey, and dashes out of the cover before anyone can train their weapons on them.

The figure whirls through the smoke, a blade flashing in their hand as they fell one enemy after another. Keith knows exactly who he’s watching dance into battle as though bringing a sword to a gunfight was perfectly reasonable. The blaster fire starts to come from a different direction, and the figure leaps out of frame, presumably pushing further into the fray.

Not a single guard stands. Another helmeted figure steps out of the thinned smoke, of compact build and holding a sleek blaster to match. Their head turns to face the camera, and they raise their weapon.

The screen fizzes and goes black.

The markings on the helmet. He’s seen it somewhere before.

Ilun clears his throat awkwardly. “ _Did anyone else see that?_ ”

“Ilun, how much time do you have left on your thing?”

“ _My_ — _about ten doboshes. It’s a download, Keith. Surely you have those on your home planet._ ”

“Can you pause it?”

“ _I_ _n a way, yes,_ ” says Ilun haltingly. “ _I’ll retain most of the information I’ve obtained so far, but it’ll take me some time to get back in once I’ve been unplugged._ ”

“That’s fine. Do it.”

“ _No._ ”

Keith almost misses the word, he’s already reaching for the drive. His hands stop an inch away as it registers in his head. “No? Why?”

“Why? _I don’t know what you’re doing. The mission takes priority. If you remove that drive in the middle of the download, all the data we’ve obtained will be lost._ ”

“I have to help them.”

“ _Two people. It’s two people, Keith. The information we can get here will save a hundred more._ ”

“What’s the point if we let the ones in front of us _die_?”

“ _Keith. I’m no monster. Think._ ” Ilun still sounds completely in control, somehow. “ _They’re clearly capable people._ _You can wait nine more doboshes, and so can they.”_

Keith quietens.

He waits nine more doboshes.

The west wing camera stays empty for all nine of them.

The loading bar finishes. “ _Go time,_ ” Ilun says in Keith's ear, and he yanks the drive out of the panel to fasten it safely into his belt pouch. “ _That drive is made of more resilient material than you are, so focus on keeping yourself out of danger. I’ll watch your back. Good luck._ ”

He clambers onto the control panel, trying to avoid stepping on any buttons or screens. From up here, it's a short reach to pry the shutter off the vent with his sword and slide it back inside, and a quick jump to grab it and haul himself up and into it.

The Dahlug uses a different air purification system than the newer models of cruiser, Kolivan had said. Larger vents, but a smaller network. As one of the few members of the Blade small enough to even fit into the vents in the first place, Keith would have an advantage, but it wouldn't take him everywhere he needed to be.

“Ilun. I'm in the vents. Lead the way?”

“ _Certainly. Right at the first turn, then left again…”_

Ilun’s directions lead him toward the docking bay, the only link in the vent system anywhere near the west wing. He presses a ear to the shutter. It's completely silent, so he slowly prises it off before leaping down into the room.

The docking bay isn’t empty.

He lands on his feet, sword already in hand, lunging for the figure closest to him.

A blaster shot catches him in the face before his blade can make contact.

He's thrown some distance away, landing heavily, then skids some distance more.

The figure he would've hit gives a shout. It's a strange word, with hard edges. He realises it's a name when the shooter pauses, and no more shots are fired.

He struggles to his feet immediately, blinks away the dizziness. His body armor had protected him from most of the impact, but the tranquil purple tint over his vision is gone. The shot deactivated his mask. He presses a hand to his face instinctively, trying to hide it from view.

“Agent. _Agent._ ”

He’s disarmed. Sword. Where’s his sword? He catches a glimpse of gunmetal blue in the corner of his eye and when he turns to look he sees a familiar, vain sword.

“Agent.” It's Lotor. “What are you doing here? Was this your door out?”

“I was…” He blinks a bit more, shakes his head. “No, I was coming to help.”

“Help?” The word comes out like a confused laugh. “Why?”

“I—”

He's cut off by the movement of the gunman raising their blaster again. Their posture, the helmet. He's definitely seen that before.

Lotor says the strange word again. He realises belatedly that it’s a name—Acxa _._ “What are you doing? I told you to stand down.” He turns to Keith. “She's quite jumpy. You of all people should understand.” He smiles with the side of his face that doesn't hold a slowly blooming bruise.

“Lotor.” Acxa doesn’t move. “That's a Paladin of Voltron.”

Keith swings at her.

He manages to knock the blaster out of her hands, but immediately she's drawn a bladed staff of her own and slices at his neck, and he dodges backwards. They exchange a couple more blows before he realises who she is.

She leaps away from him and stills. They stare at each other, weapons in hand but unmoving.

"You," she says.  
  
Keith furrows his brows at her.

A short silence passes. Acxa slowly backs down and sheathes her blade, and Keith follows. “Oh,” says Lotor, regarding them warily. “So we aren't going to kill him.”

“No,” she says, retrieving her blaster off the floor. Then she thinks for a bit, and asks, “Do you want me to?”

Lotor blinks. “I suppose not. Are you going to tell me how you two know each other?”

“Maybe. Later.”

“Fair enough.”

Keith's gaze darts back and forth between the two. “So do you guys need my help or not? Because I've got better things to do.”

"You wish to earn another favour? How much time do you have, agent? Paladin?" Lotor smiles, ever the affable prince.

Keith counts off the questions on his fingers. "I have about half a varga, I don't need another favour, and either is fine."

Lotor’s grin grows teeth. "That was where you’re supposed to tell me your name, Paladin."

Keith responds with teeth of his own. "I don't believe your intelligence network can’t find out the names of the Paladins of Voltron."

A bark of laughter escapes Lotor's throat. "A fair assumption!"

"Can we please focus?" Acxa. "If you could lend us your sword, that would be ideal. We need to cut through to where we need to go."

The laughing lines on Lotor's face twitch into an expression of annoyance, before snapping right back to a calculated calm. It gives Keith whiplash. "Yes. Paladin, if you could direct most of the force away from us, we would have a much easier time making our way to the storage bay. As it is now, we could just make our escape, but we really do need what's in this ship."

"Sounds like just a straightforward attack mission." Business mode. Keith can do business mode. "How many guards, and in which direction?"

Acxa raises her wrist and taps the side of her gauntlet, bringing up a small holographic display of the dreadnaught blueprints. It zooms into a section of the lower half. Keith recognises it as the west wing. "Currently, we know there are guards and sentries waiting by both entrances to the docking bay, but neither will attack until they've amassed a large enough force to completely overwhelm us. Only the right side is yet to be fully armed, so we have to take that exit. From there, we'll go to the storage bay, and you'll head in the opposite direction.”

“Got it.” Keith weighs his dagger in his hand, then pauses. “Kind of a long shot, but do either of you have a spare mask or something? I can’t go out like this.”

Acxa shrugs, already halfway through putting on her own helmet. Lotor examines his own carefully ragged outfit and unwinds a piece of dark cloth from his arm. He hands it out to Keith. “It’s not the cleanest rag around, but will this suffice?”

Keith wraps it around the bottom half of his face and ties it off. It’s soft, too soft to be used as just part of a raggedy outfit. He tries to smile in thanks, then realises Lotor can’t see it, and settles on just saying, “Thanks.”

“I will be needing that back,” Lotor says, putting on his own helmet. “My disguise is incomplete without it.”

“It’s just a piece of cloth.”

“It’s all in the details, Paladin.” Keith can’t see Lotor’s face, but he knows he’s grinning. “And any respectable person pays their debts, don’t you think? Or it’ll have to cost you a favour.”

“Oh,” intones Keith. “How awful. One less favour from some random prince. What will I do.”

“You will try not to die, Paladin,” says Acxa.

“That would be ideal, yes,” adds Lotor.

“But still,” she continues, “I’m not that worried about someone who managed to ruin Lotor’s face that badly.”

“Now hold on a tick,” Lotor replies.

“Positions,” says Acxa.

They take up their positions; the two blades on either side of the exit, and Acxa slipping behind a large crate for cover.

She aims and fires at the locking mechanism, and the door springs open to reveal the startled congregation of robot sentries and guards behind it. One trigger-happy gunman lets loose a shot, which ricochets off the floor and into the docking bay. It pings uselessly off a wall.

For all intents and purposes, the bay appears to be completely empty.

Then Keith lunges into the exit corridor with blade in hand.

Standard-issue weapons for Galra foot soldiers usually come in ranged varieties, to take out enemies in long corridors and wide, sprawling rooms before they can get close. But right up against an opponent, the rifles are nothing more than unwieldy, useless hunks of metal. A guard sees the sentry next to them fall and swings their rifle at Keith like a bat, but Keith blocks the untrained swing easily and dispatches them in an instant. Another fires a shot, but it catches another sentry in the shoulder and it crumples to the ground, and he takes them out while they’re still frozen in surprise.

The pounding of battle in his ears is loud, loud enough that the quiet hum of a rifle blast charging up behind him suddenly registers in Keith’s mind, a split second too late.

_Ah, hell_ , he thinks, and braces himself.

Instead of a blast to his back, he hears the familiar sound of a deflected shot, followed by a grunt and a heavy thump on the floor.

He releases his held breath and leaps back into the fray without looking back.

Against two expert swordsmen and the sharpshooter following close behind, the unprepared rifle brigade falls within doboshes, leaving their respective paths unhindered. They pause amidst their fallen opponents, and a terse silence hangs in the air.

Acxa is the first to speak. “We don’t have long.” She doesn’t elaborate, doesn’t have to. Reinforcements would be just around the corner. If they were going to each make a break for it, it would have to be now. Her gaze darts between them both, then she gives Keith a curt nod and turns and dashes off towards the west wing, alone.

Lotor’s helmeted head turns to watch her go, then turns back to Keith, and then back at the now-empty corridor. His hands twitch at his sides. It takes Keith a second to realise that the sole prince of the Galra empire is hesitating.

Keith takes a breath and says, “One favour, Lotor.”

“Huh?” replies Lotor, intelligently.

“You only owe me one favour.” He lifts his hand and taps on the ‘rag’ made out of too-fine cloth. “Because I’m keeping this.”

“Why? What for?” Lotor is clearly at a loss. “What good does it do you?”

“Who knows? Maybe I need something to sneeze into. Maybe I just want to ruin your outfit.” He stares at the cold surface of the helmet, wondering where Lotor’s gaze is. “Doesn’t matter anyway. I want it.”

Lotor swallows. Keith’s eyes involuntarily track the movement, and Lotor’s hand jerks up to his neck, as though he could still hide it from view. “Well. Sure. If that’s what you want. That’s your favour, Keith.”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll have to find Acxa. And the materials.”

“Don’t get caught.”

“We won’t.”

“Oh, and uh,” Keith says, gesturing to the side of his own face. “Sorry again. About the face.”

Lotor’s head tracks the motion of Keith’s hand. “I’m sorry, too,” he says, and there’s a strange note to his voice that makes no sense and Keith wants to rip off the helmet to see the expression painted on those sharp features. Instead, he turns on his heel and sprints the other way, past the second brigade, leading them away from the west wing.

It’s a good few more doboshes before he loses the brigade, and it cuts too close to his time limit for comfort. He pulls off the cloth mask when he approaches the escape hatch again, tying it off carefully onto his own arm. His helmet comes back on with just a single tap of his finger.

“Ilun, come in.”

“ _Loud and clear, Keith._ ”

“Mission’s a success. I’ll be waiting.”

 

“So,” says Ilun when he’s retrieved him from the asteroid where’d jettisoned himself onto after escaping the dreadnaught. “That sure was something.”

Keith unfastens the drive from his belt and chucks it at the back of Ilun’s head from his seat in the cockpit.

Ilun catches it at the side of his head without having to look back. “Don’t wanna talk about it?”

“Not until we’re far, far away from this place, and only if Kolivan will never hear it.”

“This fighter only fits two people. You can talk.”

Keith looks down at the cloth in his hands, the same shade of the unfeeling expanse of space outside. “I met Prince Lotor. He was the other intruder. Him and an associate.”

It’s a miracle Ilun doesn’t smash the little fighter into another asteroid. “You met _who?!_ How? On this mission? And on that ship?!”

“Don’t know. Said they needed some materials.”

“And you already knew who he was when you ran to help.”

Keith hesitates. “Yeah.”

Ilun exhales.

Keith hurries to make it right. “Look, Ilun. I’m sorry. But things turned out okay, and we both got what we wanted. That’s fine, right?”

Ilun shakes his head. “Prince Lotor is a wildcard. He appears to work under Zarkon, but we know that he’s working on agendas of his own. We don’t know what those agendas are. He’s dangerous.”

Now Keith falls silent under Ilun’s words, again.

Ilun sighs. “I know you would never betray the Blade. And so I promise you I won’t tell a soul.”

The cloth ripples in Keith’s hands. It really is too fine for any pirate or rebel of the Empire to have. So even the enigmatic prince made mistakes like this. “No. You’re right. Kolivan needs to know. If we can find out what the materials the dreadnought might have been carrying, then we’d be one step closer to cracking a wildcard. We’ll tell him. I’ll tell him.”

“That’s a good call, Keith.” Ilun turns around in his seat to give Keith a reassuring smile, but Keith isn’t looking at him. He’s staring at the rich cloth clutched in his grasp, eyes wide. In the unstained and untinted light of the cockpit, Keith realises that the cloth isn’t black, but a deep, dark purple.

_That’s your favour, Keith_.

He did know his name, after all.

“Keith? You alright?”

Keith blinks. “Ilun?”

“That’s me.”

“If there are any assignments on Lotor, I want them.”

Ilun’s looked confused this whole time, but his brows unfurrow and he shrugs. “I’m giving up on trying to figure out what you’re thinking. But that’s a big ask, after this whole fiasco. You’d owe me a big favour.”

“One favour to collect on another,” says Keith, as cryptically as he possibly can. “Sounds reasonable.”

Muttering under his breath, Ilun turns back to the dashboard of the fighter. Keith laughs under his breath.

The cloth winds neatly around the hilt of his dagger, tucking neatly into a fold. He holds it up to the glass of the windshield where it fades into the star-flecked darkness, leaving only the gunmetal of his blade and its faintly glowing symbol.

Favours are an unpredictable currency, and Keith likes to think that maybe he needs a little less of that in his life. So, no debts. No favours, nothing owed. The next time they stand across from each other, Lotor should hold nothing back, and Keith will do the same..

He grins to himself, a quiet, ravenous thing that Ilun won’t see.

He can’t wait.

**Author's Note:**

> the title of the fic is from Not Your Enemy by Point Blank Society! i'm not saying it's a keitor song but mmm boy. it sure is a song
> 
> thank you for reading!!


End file.
